N Korea train station 'obliterated' by blast

Rescuers sift through rubbles after a catastrophic explosion at the railway station in Ryongchon, North Korea yesterday. At least 154 people, including 76 students, were killed and more than 1,300 people had been injured in the blast at the railway station in the town of Ryongchon near the Chinese border on April 22. PHOTO: AFP

"The railway station and its vicinity were obliterated," said John Sparrow, the Red Cross' representative in Beijing, after talking to colleagues who visited the scene.

The massive explosion, at Ryongchon train station near the Chinese border, was caused by an accident involving two train carriages packed with dynamite on Thursday.

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World Health Organisation aid worker Eigil Sorensen said buildings had been destroyed up to 500 metres (1,700 feet) from the blast site and windows had been blown out over a 10-kilometre (six-mile) radius.

"There was substantial damage, no doubt about it," he said by telephone from Pyongyang. "Within 400 to 500 meters (1,300 to 1,700 feet) from the blast site, we saw buildings either totally destroyed or seriously damaged."

About 300 of the 1,300 injured had been hospitalised, mostly in the nearby city of Sinuiju.

But Sorensen said only five people were still missing, easing fears that hundreds of people may have died.

"All the people are accounted for, except five," he said. "We were told about 150 people had died, 50 percent of them children."

A three-storey agricultural school was located 100 meters (330 feet) from the blast site, while a primary school, also three storeys high, was 300 meters (1,000 feet) away, he said.

"The primary school had just ended when the explosion happened," he said. "Some children were on their way home, while others were trapped in the building."

The aid workers were invited to assess the devastation after North Korea made a rare appeal for international help.

North Korean officials acknowledged the explosion for the first time on Saturday, saying at least 154 people were killed -- including 76 children -- and 1,300 were injured in the blast.

Jang Song Gun, an official leading rescue efforts, told the Chinese news agency Xinhua that an oil tanker collided with wagons of ammonium nitrate fertilizer, knocking down an electricity pole which triggered the blast.

Xinhua said two huge holes eight meters (26 feet) deep and 10 meters (33 feet) wide punctuated the spot where the blast occurred.

South Korean experts said North Korea went out of its way to admit to the disaster and accept offers of aid, indicating the gravity of the tragedy.

"It seems that the extent of damage must be so great as for the North to reach out to international community for help," Professor Kang Seung-Yoon of the North Korean department of Dongguk University said.

"Pyongyang must also have felt it necessary to calm the rumor that the explosion might be related to some plot to assassinate Kim Jong-Il," he said.